THEATER

THEATER; Out & Out

By JESSE GREEN

Published: February 1, 2004

IN novels like ''I'll Take It,'' movies like ''In & Out'' and especially plays like ''Jeffrey'' and ''The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told,'' Paul Rudnick has taken an openly gay theatrical sensibility into the mainstream more successfully than any comic writer could have imagined possible even 10 years ago. In his new play, ''Valhalla,'' which opens on Thursday at New York Theater Workshop in the East Village, Mr. Rudnick brings that sensibility to a new realm, literally: ''Valhalla'' stars Peter Frechette as mad King Ludwig of Bavaria, the notoriously insatiable aesthete who in the mid-1800's bankrupted his treasury by building (among other follies now adored) fairy-tale castles, underground grottoes and the Festspielhaus at Bayreuth. In his own mad castle -- a downtown loft so encrusted with Gothic froufrou you would not be surprised if King Ludwig himself were the decorator -- I spoke to Mr. Rudnick about recent developments in gay theater, and his role in it. JESSE GREEN

JESSE GREEN -- Not long ago, any play with gay content was out to shock you or, worse, teach you a lesson. Whereas in ''Valhalla,'' you have two flagrantly homosexual main characters whose gayness is nevertheless secondary. Call it post-gay theater, even though the basic setting is a pre-gay world.

RUDNICK -- I've had a lifelong fascination with Ludwig. Why do his castles -- one is the model for the Magic Kingdom castle at Disneyland -- remain touchstones for so many people from every gender preference group and walk of life?

GREEN -- Over-the-top gay taste becoming as mainstream as you can get.

RUDNICK -- Exactly. There's a common chord of fantasy that Ludwig continues to strike. And I wanted to see how Ludwig's life would ultimately illuminate a seemingly disconnected character -- a gay kid from Texas in the 1940's.

GREEN -- James Avery is an outrageous invention: sexually unbridled in a way we don't associate with that time and place. In an old-fashioned play he would have committed suicide or been murdered; here, he gets his man and his dance number and, thanks to World War II, a chance to see Ludwig's treasures.

RUDNICK -- Some American soldiers would steal the precious artworks they found during the war and sell them on the black market. But what I wanted to explore was not so much the profiteering as the idea of what contact with that level of European culture and that scale of beauty might do to a small-town American kid.

GREEN -- So your real subject is the demands and dangers of beauty. It's a gay thing, but not only a gay thing. The word gay is never even used.

RUDNICK -- Once. Seeing how Ludwig created this gorgeous, garlanded cavern filled with flowers and swan boats and an artificial lake, one of the characters comments, ''It's like nature if God was gay.'' I couldn't resist.

GREEN -- So is gayness to be seen as normal or spectacular?

RUDNICK -- Gayness is as endlessly and intimately varied as any other aspect of humanity.

GREEN -- Ludwig and James are almost lunatic in their passion for beauty. Did they have to be gay to make that work?

RUDNICK -- Not necessarily, but I do consider those things to be a form of gay soul. And what the world is more and more coming to realize is that so many people of every gender persuasion share it.

GREEN -- Is that a change, or are we just acknowledging something that was always so?

RUDNICK -- I think it was always so, but it often was disguised. If you look at a Broadway show like ''The Boy From Oz,'' Peter Allen is a fascinating cultural figure because he's someone who could only have existed at a certain seam in pop culture development. Here was a man, who while never openly gay, managed to marry a gay icon, be the son-in-law of one of the greatest gay icons of all time and use his sexuality to seduce a mass audience. He's a real bridge between Paul Lynde and Larry Kramer.

GREEN -- Why do you think straight audiences are going? It can't only be to see Hugh Jackman take his shirt off, because how many times can that excite you enough to pay $100?

RUDNICK -- Science hasn't determined that yet. Still being studied.

GREEN -- O.K., then how would you describe the appeal of the gayness of that show -- an appeal that's strong enough to keep a mediocre piece of work running at least as long as Jackman is in it?

RUDNICK -- Whoever plays that role has access to an enormous flamboyance. Often, musical theater tends to belong to female performers because they're allowed a far greater emotional range. They can belt. They can weep and recover. Curly in ''Oklahoma!'' and Harold Hill in ''The Music Man'' are somewhat restrained characters. But a character like Peter Allen gives you access to all of those Dolly, Mame, Mama Rose emotions.

GREEN -- ''Oz'' is only one example in a season notable for gay material being marketed to general audiences. Let's talk about a few others. ''I Am My Own Wife,'' about the German transvestite Charlotte von Mahlsdorf: I enjoyed it but found myself asking, especially since it moved to Broadway, ''Will anybody who is not attuned to gay issues come to this play?''

RUDNICK -- It's lunacy to imagine that a play can only speak to your personal experience. In that case, every play would have to be set in your living room.